Wednesday, March 12, 2008

Crisis Management

What are things to be careful about when you are doing project management during crisis in a project.

There can be many forms of project crisis .....

let me start with one ......."dis-satisfied customer"

The biggest point of dissatisfaction comes to a customer when he finds that his requirements / expectations have not been met.

Mitigation action to expectation is little easy to handle. Ensure that SOW (statement of work)/ TO (task order) is very clear and all the do's and dont's are mentioned there in with clear information on procedure for that additional requirement handling.

But still to keep your CSAT high, you need to always know what are the free-bee's that can be provided to the client and how to harp about them.

Problem area : missing on client requirement

Some things that can be done as a PM to ensure no client escalations arise

Ensure that the complete end to end process is in place

All checklists are created

Verify all client requirements personally

Conduct regular quality and technical audits

Keep taking a regular feedback from the customer

Problem area : Dynamic and unclear client requirement

The client is unsure of what he needs and what he can achieve in his set up. Their inexperience with the IT set ups are usually the reason for it.

If you encounter a dynamic client, try to figure out who will be the key communicators on their side and the stakeholders. It is very important that at any point of time you and the stakeholders have a good dialogue in operation with no scope left for communication gap of any kind.

It is also important to be honest to the client along with generating revenue for your own company. Try to give the best possible solution to the client that will optimize his requirements and their closures. The confidence that you enjoy as the face of your company from your clients is what will help solve many hidden and unpercieved risks of any project execution.